


Here We Go Again

by Teardropfires



Category: Inception (2010)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-10
Updated: 2015-10-10
Packaged: 2018-04-25 17:03:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,977
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4969141
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Teardropfires/pseuds/Teardropfires
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>None of them thought they’d work together again, not like Inception. Not under the stress, not risking their life, and not racing against time and death. But leave it to Cobb to mess it up for all of them.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Here We Go Again

 

None of them thought they’d work together again. Not in this capacity. Sometimes when Eames was in a bit of a pinch, he’d hide out in Ariadne's loft in Paris, maybe in LA if Cobb was feeling particularly generous. He wasn’t really allowed back at Yusuf’s after the unfortunate incident with one of the cats.

Neither of them liked to talk about it.  

Apart from the occasional get together, none of them really saw each other in a professional setting anymore. Ariadne, Yusuf, and Cobb came together when Eames conned his way onto American Ninja Warrior to watch the mess unfold. That had been fun.

Sometimes Cobb will call them up for some off the wall proposition that they entertain for his sake, but never really expect a follow through. After inception, there’s only so much any of them can expect to survive.

Cobb has his kids and his crazy ideas, Yusuf has his “pharmacy” and … most of his cats, thanks to Eames, who has his traveling and a stream of crazy cons that keep him busy. Ariadne has school, a few contracts here and there, and per Eames suggestion and Yusuf’s chagrin, a puppy that will grow to be half her size.  Their get-togethers are few and far between, but one thing the inception job did for them was made them close.

Arthur, well he was a different story. Arthur had gone off the grid after the Inception job. Sometimes sending the occasional birthday card, a random holiday present, and surprising them all when he was almost definitely spotted in the crowd at James’s graduation from elementary school, because those are apparently a thing.

Eames had attempted to find him once. Mostly for shits and giggles, but partly because he and Ariadne had gotten drunk the week before and both said a bit too much about how they felt for the salty bastard. Eames had shown up to Ariadne’s flat almost a month after with his arm in a makeshift sling and a few questionable wounds on his back demanding all of her whiskey. Once properly tossed, he just chalked it up to digging too far into the wrong types of groups, but Ariadne never felt sure about that. And if the blank stare in Eames’ eyes was anything to go by, neither did he.

She never told Eames she’d gone searching for him too. Definitely not after that night, but she had. She’d enlisted the help of her sometimes-boyfriend with experience in hacking to look through every crevice and crack. Some days, she felt like she was a few steps behind him and then suddenly he’d be smoke in the wind again. She had planned on continuing, this little game of theirs. It had been exciting, finding the breadcrumb of clues left behind.

But Eames had been a message. And she could take the hint.

None of them thought they’d work together again, not like Inception. Not under the stress, not risking their life, and not racing against time and death. But leave it to Cobb to fuck it up for all of them.

+++

Ariadne shoots awake, confused and tangled in a mess of blankets and limbs, when she hears the pounding on the door.

“Ah what the fuck,” The lump next to her says. Ariadne ignores him, more focused on reaching for the small gun hidden on the bottom of her bed. Her eye catches the time as she bends down: 3AM. Her mind reels for a moment in panic before she calms as the cool metal slides into her palm. She pulls a shirt over her head that she instantly knows is not hers as she slides out of bed and cautiously makes her way to the door.

“What’s going on?” She hears from the bed.

“Shh,” she says quickly as she exits. In the hallway she can hear clear in the absence of the loud banging, a series of soft clicks, and her heart speeds up as she hurries closer. She trains her gun at the door and releases the safety. As the lock clicks out of place, the sound of her gun chamber sliding into place echoes in the silence after.

“Oh don’t be bloody dramatic,” comes Eames’ muffled reply from the other side of the door.

“Fucking shit,” she breathes out in relief and lowers her gun.

Eames opens the door and levels her with the most unimpressed look before he closes the door behind him. “A bit paranoid are we?”

“You try having some idiot break into your apartment at three in the morning, Eames,” She says and puts her gun on the table. “What are you even doing here?”

“To tell you to kick the twink out of your bed and come with me,” Eames says and walks past her to her kitchen.

“He’s not a tw—wait how did you know some one was here,” Ariadne says as she follows behind him. “How long have you been here?”

“God, you are in it today aren’t you,” Eames says as he opens her refrigerator. “I’ve been in the city for approximately 20 minutes now. I know you’re type.”

He pauses to take a long sip of orange juice from the container, “Plus, that shirt is not that big on you, mosquito bites,” he says and then winks at her.

“Are you done?” Ariadne says running her hand through her hair, closing her eyes as a headache starts to bloom behind them.

“Hardly,” Eames says and closes the door to the fridge, juice still in hand. “Kick the man out, we’ve got about an hour before our plane leaves and Yusuf’s flight should be here soon.”

“Eames, I’m not taking any jobs right now, I told you this last time—“

“Which is why I’m not asking,” Eames says and walks past her towards her bedroom. “And this isn’t a job. This is a rescue mission. “

Ariadne pauses to mull those words over in her sleep addled brain. She barely registers Eames turning on the light to her bedroom and yelling “Hello sunshine, time to wake the fuck up.”

+++

“All I’m saying is that, Ariadne is right, you didn’t have to pull your gun out on him,” Yusuf says as they pull up to the Cobb residence. The LA sun is setting, casting a dusty glow across the lawn and Ariadne is ready two fling her self from the car at this point. She’s spent the past few hours listening to this nonsense.

“I gave her the option to kick him out and she didn’t. We didn’t have that much time. Whose bloody side are you on anyway? You weren’t even there,” Eames complains.

Ariadne shoots him a glare and Yusuf stares between the two of them and then at the house in front of them and opens the taxi door. “We’re here now, mustn’t keep Miles waiting.”

Ariadne sighs and goes to the trunk to get her bags.

“You can’t ignore me forever,” Eames says as he reaches in before her and picks up most of the bags.

“You didn’t have to threaten to dismember my boyfriend.”

“Boyfriend? In his dreams,” Eames scoffs and starts to walk away. Ariadne scowls at his retreating back and bends down to pick up the remaining bags.

“Whatever,” Ariadne calls behind him as she closes the trunk shut.

Yusuf is already holding the door open for them as they approach.

“Plus, you made me leave my dog.”

“I told you I’d have a friend come by and take care of it,” Eames says.

“Are they going to break in to my apartment to?”

“Well yes, I don’t see the big deal if you know it’s coming.”

“Eames!”

“Some things never change.”

They all turn and to the sound of the new voice.

“Arthur?” Ariadne says at the same time as Eames drops their bags with a gruff. “What the hell?”

“What are you doing here? Where’s Miles?” Ariadne asks.

“Phillipa called me, and he took them to a vacation home of theirs up north. We figured it’d be safer,” Arthur says and walks closer to the three of them. He bends over to pick up a bag. “Here let me help you guys get settled.“

“We got it,” Eames says and intercepts his grab. Eames starts to pick up all of the bags and then grunts and gestures to Yusuf for the remaining bags. Ariadne watches them disappear up the stairs before she slowly turns her attention back to Arthur.

“This is a surprise,” Ariadne says. Arthur turns to look at her, and he looks _different._ Not bad or anything close to it, if anything he looks really good, healthier and muscular. Her mind helpfully supplies the Arthur she grew to know and care about, the Arthur that trained her in dream sharing. The Arthur on the constant run with Cobb. She compares that Arthur to the one standing in front of her, loose limbed in some khakis and a graphic t-shirt with his hair growing out and loose waves and a shadow of some hair on his chin and jaw. Her mind screeches to a halt before it can get to the word hipster, but it’s a damn close call.

“Phillipa called me,” Arthur says again and turns around to disappear back to where he’d come from.

“So you’ve said,” Ariadne says as she follows after him into the kitchen just in time to see him pull out several bottles of beer. He twists the cap off of one and slides it across the island where she catches it neatly. She looks down at the bottle contemplatively. “I guess it makes sense. You’d leave a way to contact you with the two people we wouldn’t bother to ask.”

Arthur smiles as he starts to twist off the caps to the others, and Ariadne wants to be mad or annoyed by it, mostly out of solidarity for Eames, but it honestly makes her happier than she’d like to admit to see him. “Where have you been Arthur?” She asks softly.

Arthur huffs out a sigh and shrugs as he comes closer to her with the beers.

“Nowhere,” He says and leans against the counter, smile growing. “Everywhere.”

“Well how bloody fucking vague is that, you goddamn tosser,” Eames says from the door. Arthur and Ariadne turn to look at him as he walks further into the kitchen, Yusuf close behind him. Arthur hands out one of the bottles to Eames who just stares at it and Arthur like it’s about to sprout wings, before Yusuf takes it and passes it to Eames and then reaches for the other one in Arthur’s hand for himself.

“Let’s get to planning on how to get Cobb back to his children, shall we?” Eames says and walks out of the kitchen.

“I take it he’s still mad about the arrows in the back?” Arthur says nonchalantly.

Ariadne can’t help but laugh, it might be a little manic, and says, “Something like that.”

“Will we be ordering any take away at all this evening,” Yusuf says, gesturing towards Arthur.

“If you two are done chatting with Katniss in there,” Eames starts.

“Alright, alright,” Yusuf says and follows behind him.

“Let’s get to it then” Arthur says and walks into the other room, leaving Ariadne alone in the kitchen, eyes trailing behind him, with the oddest since of déjà vu.

In the other room Eames is already flipping through a manila folder with Yusuf staring over his back. “What is this?” He asks distractedly.

“That’s everything I know so far,” Arthur says and reaches to pick up another folder and turns and hands it to Ariadne. “A list of all of Cobb’s known, enemies, for lack of a better word and some notes on their recent activity.”

He looks back towards Eames and Yusuf and points to the folder in their hands, “I did some digging on Cobb’s computer and found out what and who he’s been working with in the past months and started doing some research on them.”

“Some?” Yusuf asks turning one of the pages over Eames shoulder. “There are dozens of pages on these people. How long have you been at this?”

“A few days,” Arthur starts.

“You knew about this for days and you didn’t bother to tell anyone until now?” Eames says tossing the files back onto the table.

“I didn’t want to bother anyone if I knew I could do it by myself, but—“

“Oh, so you just thought you—“

“Guys,” Ariadne says looking down at the pages in front of her. “Robert is in this folder.”

“Fischer? Yeah he’s in ours too,” Yusuf says and picks up the folder again and flips to another page.

“Yeah, Cobb’s pretty decent at covering his tracks but I think he’s been tracking his progression over time, making sure the inception has stuck. I told him not to do it a few months back when I noticed but I’m not sure he’s listened.”

“Well hopefully he wouldn’t be stupid enough to go poking around,” Eames says and looks back down to the pages. “There’s at east 15 other leads here, let’s start with those.”

They don’t really get much done the first night. Eames is determined to disagree with any plan that Arthur comes up with, no matter how sound it is, on what Ariadne thinks is some kind of wounded pride. So she’s stuck mediating, until Eames can get his head out of his ass and actually contribute to the plan, or stop complaining. He comments on his hair, and his clothes, and his lackadaisical attitude and actually does call Arthur a hipster.  

This type of crazy carries on well into their first few hours of planning.

“I get it Eames,” He shouts effectively shutting everyone up. “I left and went off the grid without a single word. I’m a soulless asshole unless Cobb is involved and I could have gotten you killed months ago. I get it!”

“You bastard,” Eames says and then points to Ariadne. “I told you he knew.”

“Eames,” Ariadne says resignedly.

“I’m sorry,” Arthur continues, “But we can hash it out after this is all over, we can talk about everything. Lay it all out on the table. But Eames,” Arthur says and leans forward on his hands and stares at him. “Now is not the time.”

Ariadne feels like there’s a part of this puzzle that she’s missing. Something about the way Arthur had said that, and even more to how Eames is now looking back, oddly reminiscent of the distant look 6 months ago, makes her think again about how close the two old sometimes-friends actually are.

“You can keep your sodding apologies, Arthur,” Eames says evenly. “Let me know when we have a plan, Ariadne.”

“Eames,” Arthur says as the other man walks past them out of the room. A few seconds later they hear the front door slam.

“Um,” Yusuf says awkwardly, “I’m going to follow after him.”

Once they’ve heard the door close shut for the second time, Ariadne clears her throat. “Are you going to tell me what all that was about,” She asks. “The truth?”

“No,” Arthur says, finality clear in his voice, and looks back down to their mind-map of ideas. “We know Cobol isn’t keeping him in Mombasa. They know he has contacts there.”

“He does?” Ariadne asks as she moves closer to the table.

“Fine, they think he has contacts in Mombasa,” Arthur mutters as he runs his finger along one of the lines leading to the city. She squints down at the connections, letting the puzzle of lines and faces connect and come together in her mind. Her fingers trace slowly over the lines connecting to Australia again.

“I think we’re missing something here,” She says and taps over the pin sticking into Sydney. Arthur straightens and walks closer to her. He mimics her movement and traces the line leading to Sydney, while he mutters bits of research under his breath. His hand settles next to hers, and he’s standing so close she can feel the heat of his body through her thin shirt.

He huffs out a sigh, “It just doesn’t make sense, it shouldn’t be able to wear off,” Arthur says, brow creased in confusion. Ariadne turns and leans with her hands behind her against the table.

“Just because it doesn’t make sense, doesn’t mean it can’t happen,” She says. She watches him for a few seconds as he looks across the table at the scattered pieces of information. Then suddenly he reaches for his phone. “What are you doing?”

“Putting some feelers out,” Arthur says. “Wouldn’t hurt to double check.”

After he’s done, he tosses down his phone to the table and sighs heavily.

“What a mess,” Ariadne says looking at the stacks of different leads.

“We’ll find him,” Arthur says and turns towards the kitchen and leaves. When he comes back a few moments later he’s carrying two more beers and a bag of tortilla chips. “We always do.”

“This has happened before?” Ariadne says reaching out for the extended beer.

“A while ago, when we first started we had a few scares like this,” Arthur says and sits down in one of the chairs around the table.  He points vaguely towards the research, “But a much smaller list of enemies at that point.”

“Why did you stick with Cobb for so long?”

Arthur looks at her and takes a long sip of his beer. When he pulls back he stares down at the bottle for a while. Just when Ariadne thinks he’s not going to answer, he sighs and shrugs. “You think after all these years, I’d have a better answer to this by now.”  He laughs a little and rubs his hand over his face.

“I don’t really know,” He says. He looks at her and smiles. “I guess I trusted him. Which is hard to come by in the business. And… God… sometimes he’s just really fucking brilliant. It changed my life really. It was exciting to be around to learn… and experiment. He-- he’s a true pioneer of this industry. I don’t know maybe we’re both just crazy,” He finishes. He takes another sip of his beer and sighs softly as he looks away.

“I get that,” Ariadne says before she takes a sip of her own beer. She reaches over and grabs a few chips from the bag between them and takes her time in eating, considering the words she wants to say.

“I thought that about you both,” She says after a few minutes. “Once I knew about dream sharing, there was no going back.”

“He knew it too,” Arthur says, laughing softly.

“I’m sure he did,” Ariadne agrees. “I call him sometimes just to discuss theory and different techniques and it feels like he’s done or seen it all.”

Arthur nods, smiling wistfully.

“I think the same thing about you, you know,” Ariadne says after a little while. She laughs at Arthur’s look of disbelief.

“Yeah. I practically dream in paradoxes.” She says on a laugh, only half joking. She stands and walks closers to him and leans against the table right in front of his chair. “I have this reoccurring dream with you.”

She pauses, her face flushing slightly as she tries to find the best way to admit this.

“What happens,” Arthur asks quietly.  Ariadne looks at him and their eyes meet for a second before she sighs and looks away.

“Well,” She says smiling a little bit, “You’re always sitting, leaning on the hind legs like you always used to.”

She puts her beer down and turns to stand in front of him and pushes at his shoulder. He puts his hand over hers as he leans back to balance.

“And then I just watch you keep that hold on the edges of the craziest places,” She says softly.

“And where are you in these dreams,” Arthur asks calmly as he slowly pulls her in closer, his chair only wavering slightly.

Ariadne eyes unwillingly look down to his lap, and her flush deepens. She forces herself to look him in the eye and huffs out a small laugh and he smiles back.

“I looked for you,” Ariadne says and brings her other hand to run through his hair.

“I know,” Arthur says and turns his head into her touch as he squeezes softly at her other hand in his.

“And yet she didn’t get an arrow to the back and a dislocated shoulder!”

Ariadne and Arthur both startle, at the sound of Eames voice from the hallway. Arthur looses his balance and tips backwards, still holding Ariadne’s hand, making her fall to the floor after him.

“Sorry to interrupt foreplay,” Eames says as he comes over to help Ariadne off of the ground. In a lower voice he whispers. “Told you I knew your type.”

Ariadne makes sure to really dig her heel in when she ‘accidentally’ steps on his foot as she stands up.

“Ahh,” Eames groans and pushes her off his foot. “Anyway, Yusuf has some leads.”

“Where is Yusuf,” Arthurs says as he gets to his feet.

“On the phone with one of his chemist friends, “Eames says and leans over to grab a few chips from the pile. “We saw your little message, and so Yusuf is chasing down a rookie who reached out to him several weeks ago.”

“They’re making a powerful sedative,” Yusuf says without preamble as he walks into the room. “More powerful than the one we used for inception. Which is not exactly necessary since my sedative was perfectly powerful enough, but that’s just—“

“Yusuf, focus,” Arthur says sharply. “Who is they?”

“Well I don’t know, I didn’t recognize any of the names that my colleagues gave me,” Yusuf says and hands Arthur a crumpled up receipt with some names scribbled on the back.

“Um thanks,” Arthur mumbles and then sits back down and pulls his computer to him. “ How did they make contact?”

“Mostly over the phone,” Yusuf starts, “That’s how I was contacted. But I was out of stock for what they needed. But sometimes it was with an email address.”

“Do we have those, maybe we can –“

“Track the IP address, on it,” Arthurs says squinting down at the paper.

“Surely no one would be that stupid –“

“Got him,” Arthur says. “Clive Bowen.”

“He’s in one of these files,” Ariadne says.

“Ah, Liza’s sent me a shot of her security footage of the guy who met her in person,” Yusuf says and turns his phone to show Ariadne.

She stares at it for a second and then her eyes lock on the stack of papers she’s been hovering around all night.

“It’s Fischer.”

“We don’t know that,” Eames starts.

“I do,” Arthur says and turns around the screen. “I’ve got their schedule right here.”

They all crowd in to look around he screen.

“Good, good,” Yusuf says as he takes out his phone and starts to type something out. “ There’s a list of chemicals used for the compound.”

He turns away to head out of the room, his voice trailing off the further he walks away. “With this I can create a stabilizer to combat with –“

“Great so Yusuf is on that,” Eames says as he looks over his shoulder at his retreating friend. “What next?”

“It looks like they haven’t left Los Angeles, which is a little bit annoying seeing as I been searching the goddamn globe for him,” Arthurs says. “But we have a potential holding place. Eames I want to do some surveillance, see what we’re up against. Ariadne, see if you can find the floor plans and go with him.”

“And what are you going to do, Arthur dear,” Eames says, crossing his arms defiantly.

Arthur pulls the computer closer to him and stares at it hard.” I’m going to find out what they’re trying to plant.”

+++

“Mal’s alive.” Is the first thing Arthur says when Eames and Ariadne walk back into the room several hours later.

 “Excuse me?” Ariadne says after a few shocked seconds of silence.

“That’s the idea they’re trying to plant into Cobb’s head,” Arthur says and glares down at the computer screen. “They’ve got a forger and everything.”

“Who?” Eames asks.

“Some rook, not important,” Arthur says and looks up from his screen. “How did surveillance go.”

“Green seems to be the trend of this lot,” Eames says. “Not much security, nothing particularly tricky about the layout. Plenty of entrances and exits.”

“Well maybe the surface level isn’t really the type of security we should be worried about,”  Ariadne says. “ This is Fischer we’re talking about. His mind is trained for invasion like this.”

“We’ve done it before,” Eames starts.

“And Saito almost died.”

“And this time we won’t be caught off guard,” Arthur says. “Yusuf says that he’ll need a day or two to finish the stabilizer.”

“Do we have that much time? They could already have him under,” Ariadne questions.

“I thought about that too,” Arthur says. “Given the amount of chemicals they’re mixing for this compound, it should take them some time to get it right. Yusuf thinks that if they had started immediately after they got everything gathered, or at least from the last known ingredient by us, it puts us at two or three more days, more if we’re lucky, to do recon and for him to finish the stabilizer.”

“So what do we do now?”

“We rest, tomorrow morning we’ll head back out first thing to see if we can get inside that building.”

+++

“Listen, I’m telling you there’s hardly any security there,” Eames says as he and Arthur walk back into the kitchen the next morning. Ariadne pauses in pouring her coffee to watch them.“ We were practically able to walk right in. If Yusuf doesn’t think the sedative will be ready in time, why don’t we just go get him. We’ve taken out much bigger threats than this with much less preparation, Arthur.”

“But if Yusuf is wrong, and they’ve already created and started to using the sedative, then we have no way of –“

“Alright, alright Arthur,” Eames cuts him off. “Forget I said anything.”

Ariadne looks between the two of them for a moment longer before she turns back to her mug. “Arthur your computer’s been chiming for the past hour or so,” She says before she takes a sip of her coffee and turns to watch him leave.

“You two seemed cozy last night,” Eames says as he steals her mug of coffee. She just hums noncommittally and shrugs.

“They’re all new people,” Arthur says as he comes back in, holding his laptop. He sits it on the counter and turns it towards them. “ Unless either of you recognize these names.”

Eames and Ariadne lean forward to get a better look at the names.

“No,” Ariadne says shaking her head. Eames points down to the bottom of the list.

“That one,” He says slowly. “A forger – worked with a few buddies of mine. Work’s really messy, I hear.”

“That means they’re desperate,” Ariadne says and wordlessly takes her cup of coffee back from Eames.

“Worse,” Arthur says and pulls his computer back to him to examine the screen. “It means they’re inexperienced. All of them.”

“All the better for us then,” Eames says. “We can go in take over the situation.”

“Not if it’s chaos to begin with,” Ariadne says.

“She’s right. We’ve been doing this for years and we barely pulled it off,” Arthur says. “And it didn’t even stick.”

“Stabilizer is ready,” Yusuf says sleepily. They all turn to him and stare.

“I thought you said it would take 2 days?” Arthur asks.

“Well that’s when I was planning on sleeping and eating,” Yusuf says and then yawns loudly.

“Well that’s some good news for us then,” Arthur says and closes his laptop. “Get some rest, we’re doing this tonight.”

+++

Ariadne watches the LA sun disappear behind the building as they drive down the strangely quiet streets of the abandoned district.

“They sure did pick a creepy enough location,” Yusuf mutters from the passenger side as Eames turns the corner.

“Some of Cobb’s flair of the dramatics must have lingered behind in Roberts subconscious,” Eames grumbles as he pulls to a stop.

“Alright, everybody remember the plan?” Arthur asks as he slides his gun into his waistband.

“You and Eames take care of the guards,” Yusuf starts, “ Ariadne takes out the cameras. And I-“

“Don’t drop the bloody stabilizer,” Eames finishes and Yusuf flicks him off, but pats his breast pocket as if making sure he still has it. Eames huffs out a laugh and then turns to look at them all. “Alright, let’s get on with it.”

+++

Eames had been right the security was minimal, at best.

“That was annoyingly easy,” Eames says as he takes out the last guard with a tranquilizer.

“Until they all wake up again,” Ariadne says. “How long are those supposed to last again?”

“At least five hours,” Arthur says softly as he gestures towards the door at the end of the hallway. They follow behind him slowly and wait for his signal. Suddenly he turns and kicks open the door, startling the guy sitting in a large armchair. He fumbles around for something on the floor, but Eames rushes forward and points the back of his gun to his head.

“I wouldn’t do that if I were you,” Eames says, voice deadly serious. “Hand it to me. Slowly.”

The guy slowly reaches back and hands him a small gun. Eames rolls his eyes and snatches it out of his hands.

“You know it’s not the size that counts,” Yusuf says, smirking at him.

Eames glares at him and then points to the PASIV in the middle of the room.

“Right, sorry,” he says and moves quickly to examine the device as Eames rounds the chair and points his gun at the guys face.

“You must be Clive,” Eames says.

“How do you know my na—“ Clive starts, English accent thick and gruff.

“Shh, shh,” Eames cuts in. “I’m asking the questions here mate. Now, how many levels are they going under?”

“Like I’d tell you.”

Eames points the gun more directly at him. “We can do this the hard way, Clive. Your choice mate.”

“You gonna shoot me with a tranquilizer gun, go for it,” He spits out.

Eames pulls out the gun he’d taken from him. “I could shoot you with this,” He says and points the other gun at the guys head. “Take your pick.”

“Hmm,” Yusuf says from his spot around the PASIV.

“What?” as he locks the door, done with his check to make sure the room is secure.

“Well the this sedative seems to have a few additional properties than I thought.

“How can you tell,” Arthur asks, coming closer to Yusuf. He spares a look to the sleeping forms connected to the device and kneels down next to him. “It’s in a tube.”

“Well I can tell because I know what I’m doing,” Yusuf says and then frowns back down at the device. ”Plus it’s quite a few shade lighter than it should be. Which means there is something missing or something added to the original list of – oh – he could have started with a different base—“

“Yusuf,” Ariadne says, knowing his tendency to ramble.

“Right of course. Um, Clive what base compound did you start with?” Yusuf says and glances over to the chair.

Clive looks at them all for several long seconds before he suddenly lunges at Eames, who shoots him with the tranquilizer gun before he’s hardly out of the chair.

“Eames!” Arthur yells.

“He’ll be fine,” Eames says moving away from the knocked out Clive on the ground.

“I don’t give a shit if he’s fine. We needed him, and we don’t have time to wait 5 hours for him to wake up.”

“Well excuse me for trying to protect myself from the lunatic who lunged for my gun,” Eames says back, voice rising in anger.

“Guys, enough,” Ariadne says and steps closer to hover over Yusuf’s shoulder. “How can we tell once you ingest the stabilizer if it’ll work?”

“Ah,” Yusuf says and pauses. “That’s a good question.”

“And what’s the good answer,” Eames asks.

“Well,” Yusuf starts.

“What happens if we stabilize the compound and they’re already a level under,” Eames asks.

“We’ll the timer would just run out,” Yusuf says.

“But that gives them more time,” She pauses and looks at all the people connected to the device, “ to do whatever it is they planned on doing.”

“What happens if it doesn’t stabilize,” Arthur says voice a little more urgent.

“Can you shorten the time once you’ve stabilized it,” Eames asks.

“Well. Yes,” Yusuf says simply. “But I’m finding the flaw in my plan now.”

“What?”

“We’ll without the proper equipment I can’t know without plugging in if it’s stabilizing or not,” Yusuf says.

“Jesus,” Eames says and rubs his hands over his face.

“Yusuf,” Arthur says through gritted teeth. “What happens if –“

“It means I can’t guarantee how long they’d be stuck down there,” Yusuf says resignedly.

“Then how do we get them back,” Eames asks angrily.

“We trigger kicks,” Ariadne says. “We go under and time them out. Just like the Fischer job.”

“We can’t do that,” Arthur says and sits down heavily on the desk behind him. “We spent weeks planning out each of those levels. We don’t even know how to get to each level. And even if we were able to find it we have no clue of the landscape or how stable the dreamer is. Any changes to the level could collapse it.”

“Not with the stabilizer,” Yusuf says.

“But that’s if it’s working!” Eames says

“But what if it is? Are we just going to sit here and wait for the time to run out and let them do whatever they had planned to do to Cobb happen?”

“Yes,” Eames says. Ariadne glares at him.

“No,” She says and bends down closer to the PASIV. “We’ve got an hour on the clock now. “So if the stabilizer works, it still gives us enough time to find where they are in the first level and figure out an extraction plan.”

“Ari,” Arthur says touching her shoulder to get her attention. “We’ve already established that these people don’t know what they’re doing. We could be plugging into an already collapsing dream.”

“Well unless any of you come up with a plan in the next minute it takes Yusuf to ingest the stabilizer, I’m going under with or without you guys,” Ariadne says and settles down on the floor and reaches to pull at a connection.

“There’s only two left,” She says, biting her lips as she slides the needle under her skin. “I guess I’ll see one of you in a bit.”

She pushes down on the button and the center of the PASIV and lets her world fade to black.

+++

Ariadne take a deep breath in, smelling the slightly rain scented air. She glances down on the ground, but doesn’t notice any puddles or moisture spots. “Interesting,” She says softly.

“I’d say so,” Arthur says as he settles into the seat next to her. She smiles softly as she glances at him and then does a double take. She looks down at his tailored dark slacks and matching sweater vest and tie.

“Also interesting,” she says and looks back to the ground. “ I was getting used to the t-shirts.”

“We’re on a job,” Arthur says with a shrug.

“Mmm,” She says and starts to take in her surroundings. “Oddly quiet.”

“Yeah,” Arthur says. She looks at him and then follows his gaze toward a high-rise a block or so away. “Except for over there.”

“After you,” Ariadne says as she stands.

Inside the building, the few projections that had been milling about all pause and turn to stare at them.

“Why are they looking at us,” Ariadne says body stiffening in fear. “Neither one of us is the dreamer.”

Seconds later, all of the projections gazes shift from the pair of them to the opposite side of the lobby and stare seemingly at nothing.

“Something’s not right,” Arthur mutters softly as he slowly edges in front of her. She’s just about to suggest they move away from the trove of projections that can turn on them in second, when the sound of heavy footsteps approaching fast from the other side of the lobby catches her attention.

It takes a second for her to make out his figure, and she blinks a few times making sure she’s seeing it correctly.

“Is that,” Arthur starts.

“Cobb,” She says nodding frantically.

He seems to spot them immediately and runs faster towards them. He practically collides into them and then roughly moves them towards a pair of double doors. They swing open forcefully, leading them to a large staircase.

“This’ll do,” He says and starts running. “It’s Fischer,” He yells breathlessly over his shoulder as he continues to run up the stairs. “He tried… Mal—“

“We know,” Ariadne says. She looks at Arthur who sighs heavily before he follows up the stairs behind Cobb.

“What we don’t know is: How did he figure it out in the first place?” Arthur asks, glaring at him.

“Or how did you get from the last level?” Arthur chimes in.

Cobb doesn’t answer for several seconds, more focused on getting up the stairs.

“I, um gave myself a kick.” Cobb says.

“How?”

“I jumped out of the window,” Cobb says simply.

“Of cour— You could have been dropped into Limbo,” Ariadne says and then rolls her eyes as Cobb waves her off.

“We need a plan,” Cobb says. They both glare at him and towards the ceiling as the building gives a violent shudder. Seconds later they hear heavy footsteps approaching.

“We’ve already decided to set up a kick out,” Ariadne says and pushes them forward to continue up the stairs.

“By the sound of it, we’ve got some friends out there who don’t want us to make it quite that far.” Arthur says and nods his head towards the direction of footsteps and then back to Cobb.

“Listen this is not my fault,” Cobb starts.

“They came after _you_ ,” Arthur counters. “How is this not your fault?”

“I was just following standard procedure and following up on the progress of his Inception. How was I sup—“

“If you didn’t know what would happen, how was it standard pro—“

“Shh,” Ariadne says as the footsteps get louder. “Listen we’ve got about 30 seconds before those projections catch up with us and—“

She’s cut off by another forceful shake, this time making a piece of the wall crumble next to her.

“What in the hell is going on up there?” Cobb says as he helps Ariadne away from the hole and they start at a faster pace up the stairs.

“I wonder if Yusuf’s stabilizer is working,” Ariadne says and moves out of the way of a new piece of falling wall.

“It’s doing something,” Arthur mutters. “We need to get up higher, if we’re going to use this as our kick. The higher we are the better the chance.”

“Over there,” Cobb says and points to the door on the next level. “ We can try and lose some of the projections on the other –“

The floor gives way under him and he starts to fall. Arthur lunges for him, and Ariadne after Arthur.

“He’s gone,” He says, scrambling back onto his feet. “He’s out.”

“That sounds like a plan we need then,” Ariadne says and pulls him towards the door. She pushes it open, expecting to find another hallway, but instead finds a large room with floor to ceiling windows.

As Arthur closes the door, Ariadne moves forward and turns the locks on the doors as they appear. After the sixth one, she steps back and sighs. “That should hold them off for a few minutes.”

“Which I’m assuming we need more than that,” Arthur says as he looks around the room.

“Wait,” Arthur says and grabs her wrists, pulling her towards the large expanse of windows.

“What are you doing?” She asks. As the building continues to shake, Ariadne can barely feel anything past the vibrations from the rumbling foundation. Arthur pulls a chair from its spot at a table and drags it to the edge of the window and motions Ariadne to come close. 

“What—“

“It’s your dream now,” He says softly and motions for her to come closer again. When she does, he pulls her down onto his lap and smiles up at her.

“Quick, give me a kiss,” he jokes, letting his hands settles at her waist.

She huffs out a small laugh and leans her head against his. She lets the sense of déjà vu calm her nerves and reaches up to pull at his tie. She puts her hand on the glass behind him and seconds later it shatters under her fingertips. She can feel him smile against her cheek and she pulls back as he leans back on the hind legs of the chair.

“Just like in your dream,” He says, voice oddly clear over the sounds of the projections yelling and pounding against the door. She chair sways slightly beneath them, and she shakes her head softly and sighs.

“I hope not,” she says, smiling at the look of confusion on his face. “When I wake up from those, you’re never there.”

“Maybe this time,” He says and closes his eyes. Ariadne does the same, and just as she hears the doors splinter open with a crash, she lets the sensation of the fall take over.

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> Things I don't know much about that some how made it into this story: chemistry, guns, Australians weather patterns (to be fair this was in an earlier version but whatever). So sorry about that. 
> 
> My dear, Fruityshirts. I hope you like it. I know we both had rather crazy summers and couldn't collab as much as we wanted, but I hope it's at least halfway what you wanted.


End file.
